Where is Brad Jackson, or Scarpelli, Haston, or Honnold (2nd go send on Bellyful, making it look about 5.9)? Where is the mention of the young guns who don't even specialize but still onsight 12 and send 13 in the wide (Mason Earle as an example). Edl is pretty accomplished, along with plenty of others .

Anybody even remember that Jeff P did the second on Bellyful. Who's that? Exactly my point. Lots of people out there flying under the radar who are absolutely crushing in all disciplines.

As for "most accomplished". The Brits, easily. "Most Accomplished", in my book, doesn't equal the longest tick list, it implies performing at THE top standard of the day. And they are the only ones who've done that because they set the standard with Century Crack after crushing most every hard wide thing around in VERY quick efforts. They are the best, for now.

I guess I should have added a few more disclaimers, elcapinyoazz. Although I did have Scarpelli on the list and also included the caveat of other climbers who we (me) just don't know about. Just having a little fun is all.

I don't belong on any list like that.
I haven't done anything really hard, I haven't done any of the OW climbs with
serious reputation.
The ones I can do, I usually make them look easy. That's different.

Using a golf analogy, a lot of the people mentioned would be touring pros,
that is, playing and winning tournaments.
I would be more like a teaching pro. I can spot flaws in people's technique
and I can analyze pretty well.

Imagine if we had not only the Brits but the old East Germany regime as competition. I can see those Germans breeding the super offwidth climber. Big fists and small knees, to the point where you could go from fist jamming directly to arm-barring or stacking with a knee in the crack...No calf-locking or other crappy-size techniques required.

I don't even know how they would exploit the invert...but you can bet they would.

Jul 30, 2013 - 09:28am PT
The ones that used hex's for pro. It seems it has become more similar to sport climbing with the giant cams.

I tend to agree with the one who knows. Modern gear has made OW protection vastly more reasonable.

And this from another wise of wyde aswell.

Note also there has been no mention of the people who put up all the hard runout wide in the black canyon. A huge bunch of Wyde lore there!

Virtually every major route in the Black has OW to contend with. Some of those have become legendary some infamous. Besides Dunn and Wiggins and a handful of others one climber from Gunnison who pushed the absolute limits in the precam days was Chuck Grossman. Those who have heard of him know of what I speak.

My vote goes to Randy Leavitt. I was living in So. Cal in the late '80s working on bad movies and a couple of climbers who said they knew Randy took me and a few friends out to some parking garage in the SF Valley (at about midnight), and showed us these crazy offhorribles that were really just spaces between the concrete beams in the roof (about 8 feet off the garage floor). Chalk everywhere. The story was Randy had used those to practice for his Leavittation stuff. I have no idea if these guys really knew Randy or what, but stacking in those roofs was the worst climbing experience I think I've ever had. Randy, you out there? I think it was in North Hollyweird.

That pic of Philo's becomes more impressive if you realize that it is taken looking straight up and that whole thing is a giant roof, including that bottoming bombay OW v-slot that Chuck is just entering.

Edit: I belayed Rosholt on many attempts of that thing and even belayed Bryan Becker on a failed attempt, Chuck was a nut placing master.